Los Angeles daily herald., 1887-07-16
DAILY HERALD.
FREAKS OF THE INSANE.
Some of the LudfcrOus EXPIRES
stOns of the Dementcd.

u
Some lunatics even deliberately as
sume the role of jokers. They make
horrible puns, ask conundrums and
get off poor witticisms. But us thelr
unconscious comicality that makes
them most laughable; and its effect Is
doubled by the gravity of men ana
tone with which they utter their
whimsical conceits, and which every
lecturer of the humorous species must
envy them. One day when the present
writer was attending lecture on
mental diseases in an asylum, the pro-
fessor brought In patient suffering
from ilusions--i. e., his imagination
distorted everything he saw into some
thing different. where are youP'
the professor asked the patient. "ln
a menagerie," was the answer "And
what are these beings 2" the professor
asked, pointining to the students. The
answer was consistent: Lions and
tigers and bears" When the students
laughed aloud at this unexpected ZOO
logical diagnosis, the patient insisted
that the animals were now roaring.
Frequently patients consider them,
selves partially or entirely transformed
into animals or superior beings. one
woman mentioned by kratft-Ebing in
sisted that her feet had been changed
into hoofs and her head into an OK S
head. A young man became ocn-
WINGED in the course of his disease that
he was the devil, SO he refused to take
food in order to starve the tiend. An
Austrian patient insisted that he had
lost his eyes, and wanted to 90 to Lon
don to get new pair. Being retained
against his will he refused to eat any
thing on the ground that Bismarck
had poisoned his food and that Il
million gods had warned him against
it.
NOTHING Is TOO ABSURD.
1t often happens, as in dreams, that
inanimate objects appear to the pa
tient to be alive. Atower opposite an
aged lunatic's window was taken by
him for the "world soul" One day
he saw the tower move away, and a
voice came from it which cursed him
for having destroyed the world.
Nothing is too absurd to be believed
by the demented. One patient, hav-
ing maltreated another, was taken to
task and questioned as to his motive.
He finally confessed that the
other man wanted to come
into my ward to build chimney
six miles high, and | pushed him
down stairs" ''In one case that was
under my charge" says DIR. Ham
mond, "the patient, stationer, doing
business in this city, had the delusion
were acting on him by electricity,
which they sent into his brain, through
the top of his head, by powerful bat
teries which they had in their lodge
rooms. In another, woman
conceived the idea that all the iron
railings and railway tracks had been
charged with electricity to injure her. Z"
Great ingenuity is often shown by
monomaniacs in trying to justify their
ludicrous beliefs. DIR. Hammond
knew man who believed that his
right hand was made of glass, and
who, therefore, carried it in a stout
ease to prevent its being broken.
When the Doctor tried to convince
him that his hand was flesh and
blood, and not glass, he retorted: 81
NV brain was then incapable OF
appreciating minute differences as
well as it can now; and, though | con-
fess that my senses still convey to me
the idea that my hand is like other
peoples, yet | know that the concep-
tion is erroneous and correct it at once
by my reason. Ny hand looks like
flesh and blood, but it's glass for all
that. Nothing is more calculated to
deceive than the senses"
ExUBERANcE OF FANCY.
Among Professor Krafft-Ebing's pa
tients was one who felt badly used
because they would not give him "A
needle and thread to sew ON his head,
which he maintained had been sew
cred from his body with fine cord
by a negro. The same man consid-
cred himself great magician,
and told of his adventures in
quest of the north pole, which
he found by going down into
Nesuvius. A woman in the same
hospital, previous to her admission
had purchased half finished um.
brella, saying that she was going tC
''line it with the new religion :" which
reminds one of the late Emil Scarla
of Vienna, the famous basso, who
IL short time before his malady was
discovered. went to a tailor and or
dered fur overcoat for summer use
adding that it must he lined with
electric light.
With sun, moon and stars, lunatics
are on very familiar terms. One pa
tient heard noise which she main
tanned was caused by the rolling
about of the real terrestrial globe un-
der her head. Another declared that
she fell from the moon twenty-four
years ago. There she loved the red
king of France, who was shot on the
moon. The director of the asylum
lived opposite her on the moon. But
he most extraordinary exuberance
of fancy was shown by dement,
ed officer who considered himself
the ruler of the world He also
claimed to be the greatest opera singer
in the wortd, and said he had travelled
around the earth with ladies' in a car
riage drawn by 500 horses whose
stables were made of diamonds. He
WAS willing to share the earth with
another patient after dividing it up ut
the equator. Then he intended to
divide up heaven similarity, and take
n drive in the lava Of Nesuvius mas
much as he was fireproof. He intended
10 erect Il statue a thousand million
yards in height, made of pure dia-
monds. He amused himself by shoot
ing down stars from the armament,